Second Chances for people who abandon....

.....threads without warning or notice. Any thoughts?

Also, any of you who have done it, any thoughts on why you weren't able to give ample warning to your partners?

SEVERUSMAX said:

.....threads without warning or notice. Any thoughts?

Also, any of you who have done it, any thoughts on why you weren't able to give ample warning to your partners?

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It's not that deep. For me, I get that you may have invested time and energy into threads, but so have your co-writers. They may have many other things that suddenly demand more time and energy. Reach out if you feel you must to get closure, but don't be entitled and remember that life is much wider than hobby writing.

My co-writers are always friends and generally hella busy, which may be different than anonymous authoring. I'm busy, too. However, if I have time and they abruptly don't, I find something else to do.

thestruggle said:

It's not that deep. For me, I get that you may have invested time and energy into threads, but so have your co-writers. They may have many other things that suddenly demand more time and energy. Reach out if you feel you must to get closure, but don't be entitled and remember that life is much wider than hobby writing.

My co-writers are always friends and generally hella busy, which may be different than anonymous authoring. I'm busy, too. However, if I have time and they abruptly don't, I find something else to do.

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I understand the priorities of real life, and I've had to abandon a thread or two myself, due to that, but I do feel that some kind of note would help the co-writer know that this is what is going on. If it's RL urgency, then, yes, I would respect that. It's just people who don't bother to communicate this before abandoning it.

I mean, I have a job, a family, RL responsibilities, too. But I'm simply saying, even a quick note with the letters "RL" would suffice.

SEVERUSMAX said:

I understand the priorities of real life, and I've had to abandon a thread or two myself, due to that, but I do feel that some kind of note would help the co-writer know that this is what is going on. If it's RL urgency, then, yes, I would respect that. It's just people who don't bother to communicate this before abandoning it.

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Yeah, courtesy is nice. But sometimes life just doesn't allow it and it's not all about us getting to know that someone is abandoning a thread. Different strokes, different priorities, and not everyone's the same. You would hope that people communicate to their partners or significant people that they're on this website, but some don't - it can be delicate. Diversity in outlook and standpoint are kind of what make this stuff interesting, but that could just be me. I guess I wouldn't worry about something that's so individual and transforming others is a pointless/controlling exercise, anyway. It's hard to find a sure thing, but I find amusing myself to be the best route. Otherwise, you may wanna find a new hobby!

As the vast majority of my stories end with my partner abandoning me I do believe that I have some expertise to lend on the subject.

There are many many reasons why people will drop a roleplay and while most are forgivable, there are a few that are not. When someone stops responding, one can always investigate. Most profiles show a last activity date. If someone just hasn't logged in in days/weeks/months then the reason could be anything. It could be technical - a computer failure or loss of connection. It could be a health or family issue. People lose jobs, get evicted, have children etc. All sorts of things happen and one can only give the benefit of the doubt and hope for the best. For those profiles that hide their logins, one can still post search and see when the latest post was made. Again, if there is no activity, one can never assume.

But when there is activity, then there needs to be an explanation. If someone is online often but not replying to your thread, it could mean trouble for you, but still it could just be a bout of writers' block. If they are not replying to other threads, it could be this or it could be just a lack of time. I know that myself I check my inbox and threads daily but do not always have time to sit and take the care to write something worthwhile. If your partner is posting to other threads but not yours, it still just could be that your story requires a bit more thought or effort (personally mine often do, so this happens to me quite a bit and I understand). I understand all of these things. When they happen, I usually send a friendly pm asking if everything is okay, and a good partner will respond to you fairly promptly. Great partners will even pm you first, letting you know of any delay.

What gets me is when someone is online frequently, often posting to other threads and not bothering to answer my friendly pm! Writing a reply to the thread might take a half hour, an hour, a couple of hours, definitely some significant effort, but one line in a private message takes a minute and can be done from any phone while on a break at work.

'Yes, sorry for the delay. I will reply but I will need a week or two'

or

'No thanks I've lost interest'.

Is that so hard? Most often than not, it is!!

Usually there is no reply whatsoever. You've been ghosted.

Now for those few who know me, I tend to carry myself rather eloquently and reserved, but it's these ghosts that piss me off to another dimension and bring out the most sarcastic and vile foul-mouthed cunt you'll probably find.

Ghosts are the worst thing on a forum like this and they deserve to be maimed with jagged rusty objects dipped in terpentine. Perhaps drizzled in honey and strapped to an anthill. They are the epitome of inconsiderate and/or they are useless cowards. To put in all the effort of setting up the plot and fleshing a character and writing up that intro, then a handful of posts in, it all goes down the drain just because someone didn't have the fucking attention span to follow through or they found something or someone else cheaper or baser to fap to.

And the next worst folks are those who defend them. Oh yes, I've seen more than a few debates on rp forums and in chat rooms were people will actually stand up and defend this behavior. I've seen mods discipline the ghosted, protecting the ghoster, These people deserve to be strangled with the entrails of the maimed ghosters.

Now before I get jumped on by any of you bleeding heart nightingales (and I know that you will, you always do) let me just repeat what you didn't bother reading above. I totally understand when real life gets in the way of a good (or otherwise) roleplay. That I have never and will never hold against anyone. But sometimes someone has just wasted your precious time, and yes I do understand that that is the nature of the beast in roleplay, I have accepted that from the beginning, so now you can accept my views and my rant. They are equally valid. When someone has wasted your time on a whim, because all of their promises in planning weren't worth a pile of lizard dung, it's the WORST thing you can do to someone on a forum like this.

People say, "Oh, you never know the reasons the other person has."

BULL - fucking - SHIT!

Often you don't know - I already stated that. But sometime you do know. Many times you do know. I'm no bimbo. I'm a pretty bright girl and I can put the pieces together. When someone is online regularly, is posting to other threads and asking for new requests, all the while completely ignoring your friendly messages, they are fucking you over because they are a rude coward asshole! So don't even bother rebutting this.

I think it depends on what you mean by abandon. I once had a guy tell me that women were always leaving him for no reason and no warning. Now I can't speak for what those women said or did but...

In my experience, I have dated guys or spoken to them online and from my perspective, it was going nowhere. They just weren't appealing to me or maybe they were nice but that certain spark wasn't there.

I can recall times when I told them six ways from Sunday that I just wasn't interested but they were not listening. In a case like that, I feel like I have no choice but to walk away. Yeah, I know they'll be baffled but I was nice about it and I did try.

pink_silk_glove said:

Often you don't know - I already stated that. But sometime you do know. Many times you do know. I'm no bimbo. I'm a pretty bright girl and I can put the pieces together. When someone is online regularly, is posting to other threads and asking for new requests, all the while completely ignoring your friendly messages, they are fucking you over because they are a rude coward asshole! So don't even bother rebutting this.

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K.

So you want to determine when people respond and how? It's fine that you have your own expectations and limits. However, we're talking about something that really has very little to do with a violation of YOUR limits and more about you impeding someone else's. This kind of attitude is one of entitlement to me, sorry. Find something else to do. Seriously. You can't control other people this way nor force your expectations on them. You hope that people will reciprocate your efforts, but if they don't, find people who do. Name-calling because someone didn't feel like replying to your thread in their free time seems like immaturity at best, and selfishness at worst. There's always going to be exceptions - someone you may have made a date with doesn't show, or doesn't fulfill their end of the bargain, etc etc. But that's not what you're talking about here. You're talking about an assumption that you're making - a social contract that you're the arbiter of and no one else. You may try to make this apparent prior to your interactions with other writers, but they may or may not respect it. Hey, people in long-term relationships may or may not cheat. You gotta be able to stand on your own two feet in the most personal of times, and in my opinion, this is definitely not one of them. You don't even know these people, lol. And I'm not defending any kind of behavior in particular, I'm just taking issue with your value judgments - valuing your own time has little to do with how others value theirs.

You are not owed an update. That's the bottom line. If you're in a deeply interpersonal relationship with limits made clear, that's one thing. If you're engaging in a hobby activity with strangers, that's something entirely different. I don't think someone's a rude coward asshole just because they lost interest in your thread momentarily or permanently. It sounds like you're investing a lot and getting resentful because others may not match your level of interest. That's frustrating, I understand, but it still doesn't mean that people are supposed to message you on their lunch break. You can still be passionate about your writing - but don't expect people to always match you. That's just selfish.

Just in general I think a courtesy note is nice, but there are times when life does intervene, without warning and without mercy.

Also, and kind of related to the other topic of ghosting - well, sometimes the person who did the "ghosting" did tell the other person. The other person just wasn't listening.

Life is beautiful. It's messy. It's complex. Partnerships (as in thread authors) and content providers (as in thread owners) are dissolved all the time.

Paul_Chance said:

Just in general I think a courtesy note is nice, but there are times when life does intervene, without warning and without mercy.

Also, and kind of related to the other topic of ghosting - well, sometimes the person who did the "ghosting" did tell the other person. The other person just wasn't listening.

Life is beautiful. It's messy. It's complex. Partnerships (as in thread authors) and content providers (as in thread owners) are dissolved all the time.

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This was a great way to put it, thanks for sharing!

All very interesting points and assertions, and yes, people have the right to refuse to participate or even ghost if they wish, but if they then try to return, I have the right to have nothing more to do with them.

SEVERUSMAX said:

All very interesting points and assertions, and yes, people have the right to refuse to participate or even ghost if they wish, but if they then try to return, I have the right to have nothing more to do with them.

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Agreed!

In the few RP threads I've gotten involved with I've always tried to give a little warning if I wasn't going to be able to keep up with the pace of the story line and other posters.

Although, I will admit, a few times a thread has taken a dark or gross turn which I didn't care for and in those instances I PM'd at least one or two of the main posters and told them why I was choosing to depart.

It doesn't take but a minute to be polite - even if you're totally grossed or freaked out lol.

I think if you're writing with a partner (as in an SRP) and they stop for no reason, I'd give them a reasonable amount of time to return, then either close the thread or bring in another writer.

Whether I wrote with them upon their return would depend entirely on what happened the first time. But, in general I accept "None of your business but I'm back now" as an answer. I am not seeking a relationship, but a writing partner, and since I am not paying them anything, LOL, they're free to come and go.

Courtesy matters though, even on a free board.

Paul_Chance said:

I think if you're writing with a partner (as in an SRP) and they stop for no reason, I'd give them a reasonable amount of time to return, then either close the thread or bring in another writer.

Whether I wrote with them upon their return would depend entirely on what happened the first time. But, in general I accept "None of your business but I'm back now" as an answer. I am not seeking a relationship, but a writing partner, and since I am not paying them anything, LOL, they're free to come and go.

Courtesy matters though, even on a free board.

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Fine. Whatev's. I'll be your writing partner Paul

I generally don't give people many second chances to hurt me, but for something just like writing, I try not to get too wound up in it. People (myself included, sorry FHD) are flakey and changing all the time. And they all have their reasons for not wanting to continue a story. The only time I'd be injured if someone stopped in the middle of a story, is if it was with someone I was deeply in love with and it was an extension of our actual love life. But that kind of thing is best kept out of a public eye, IMO.

Real life happens, and people aren't always able to give advance notice about an absence. Also, the reasons for their absence may be personal and the person may or may not feel like sharing them before or after their hiatus. Advance warnings and explanations are nice, but considering that I don't know most of my writing partners on here personally I've never felt like either were owed to me.

I've never intentionally "ghosted" someone I was writing with before. I've had someone do it to me once, but it didn't really bother me. I don't think I even bothered PMing them about it. I just assumed they weren't into the story and entertained myself with other writing partners. Not everyone's styles are going to mesh well together. I agree it's a rude thing to do, and I would never do it to someone, but I don't take it personally. We are just strangers after all, and this is just a hobby.

Either case, if someone decided they wanted to return to our story I wouldn't mind, though they might run the risk of losing their "spot" with me if I've started up a new story with someone else and don't have time for the old story now.

I'm usually pretty forgiving in these circumstances. There are people I have given second and third chances too. More often than not I will contact an individual to see if they are still interested, or if everything is okay before coming to any determinations and then wait for a while before making any choices.

Even if they do flat out ghost me I will try to gather a bit more information. The only time I have ever been really irritated with people is when I have waited for over a month or more for a post on a second or third 'try' or story if we started something new and a pattern of behavior repeats itself. They expressed interest in the beginning of a story, but then find new stories and end up posting on a regular basis in a handful of stories regularly but ignore all of my attempts to contact them.

I have no issue if someone loses interest in our story. I don't even care all that much if you don't take the time to tell me about it, but if I decide to write with you again and you waste my time that will get under my skin.

Real life happens to everyone, I understand that plenty. All I ask is a touch of courtesy.

(Don't worry L_S. I still love you. )

I'm a free spirit on this sort of stuff. I've had probably two dozen threads dropped and never felt particularly offended, because the vast majority of threads on this board have low starting input and investment. If you spend a couple weeks planning things out and regularly trading PMs, then you certainly have the right to be upset, but here's the flat truth:

You don't own anyone else's time or attention. You can ask for it, but that's it.

You want people to stay in a thread with you? Be interesting. Talk to them. Make them invested in you as a person, that your good opinion and continued conversation is worth more to them than the freedom of ghosting on you. The basic contradiction is that if someone's losing interest in your thread, then badgering them about it and forcing them to do it is going to kill whatever fun they were having with it stone dead. I'd rather let somebody just go do something they're actually enjoying then hang around, be miserable, and resent me because I decided what I wanted is more important than what they wanted.

It's easy to get offended because this is, nominally, a place to fulfill fantasies, but in point of fact there's still another human on the other end of the keyboard and they owe you nothing but what they decide they owe you. A dead thread is a writer's bad first date. You tried it out, and it didn't work. Move along, ladies and gentlemen. You can be a complete jerk about it, or you can smile and say good luck.

If you enjoy a thread, enjoy it while you have it. There's a real person over there, and they might be gone tomorrow, or have more important things to do, or lose interest and move along. The one certainty is that you don't get to decide.

Obuzeti said:

I'm a free spirit on this sort of stuff. I've had probably two dozen threads dropped and never felt particularly offended, because the vast majority of threads on this board have low starting input and investment. If you spend a couple weeks planning things out and regularly trading PMs, then you certainly have the right to be upset, but here's the flat truth:

You don't own anyone else's time or attention. You can ask for it, but that's it.

You want people to stay in a thread with you? Be interesting. Talk to them. Make them invested in you as a person, that your good opinion and continued conversation is worth more to them than the freedom of ghosting on you. The basic contradiction is that if someone's losing interest in your thread, then badgering them about it and forcing them to do it is going to kill whatever fun they were having with it stone dead. I'd rather let somebody just go do something they're actually enjoying then hang around, be miserable, and resent me because I decided what I wanted is more important than what they wanted.

It's easy to get offended because this is, nominally, a place to fulfill fantasies, but in point of fact there's still another human on the other end of the keyboard and they owe you nothing but what they decide they owe you. A dead thread is a writer's bad first date. You tried it out, and it didn't work. Move along, ladies and gentlemen. You can be a complete jerk about it, or you can smile and say good luck.

If you enjoy a thread, enjoy it while you have it. There's a real person over there, and they might be gone tomorrow, or have more important things to do, or lose interest and move along. The one certainty is that you don't get to decide.

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Oh, wow, now I've heard everything.

You see, what you fail to grasp here in your blissfully arrogant ignorance, is that I DON'T actually feel that I'm owed your time, and (sorry to burst your fat ego's bubble but) I am certainly NOT THE LEAST bit butthurt that you don't care about me or my writing any more.

What I DO care about is that I had a story that I put time and effort into and it suddenly stopped without a word, while YOU, my supposed partner is online every day posting to all your other stories while I wait patiently, a week, two weeks, whatever. And while I DON'T have a God given right to your time or reply, you're still WASTING MINE! (you bitch) Then when I feel that one very polite, quiet friendly nudge is in order, you don't even have the tits to say 'go away'. That's all I want. I know that you could stop at any time, but if you want to quit me, just say so. I can let go of YOU no problem (oh, you have no idea how easily), but my STORY matters to me and I'm not going to let go of it UNLESS I know for certain that it's done. Just have the common decency to not leave me hanging. Tell me that I suck, I'm boring, whatever, I don't care, just something. I'm a big girl and I honestly don't give a shit what you think of me or my skills. My ego isn't nearly the size of yours. Just tell me that the story is done so that I can stop dwelling on my potential next reply and focus my attention somewhere else.

I've had this debate before, and usually the bleeding hearts come out and defend the ghosters, saying that it's okay to just ignore someone because the ghoster feels bad and can't face up to the task of ending things. Oh, the ghoster's feelings matter, oh please. So 99% of the time it's about cowardice, plain and simple. Get a fucking backbone and have the decent courtesy to say 'sorry it's not turning out how I expected,' or 'your skills/detail/pace aren't what I thought they would be,' or 'I'm losing interest,' or just 'this sucks, fuck off,'. You hit the reply msg button, type for ten seconds and hit send. Done.

But in your case Obuzeti, I don't really see cowardice, at least not judging by the pompous righteous bullshit grandeur of your post above. You're just FUCKING RUDE.

Sure, I'm owed nothing by the laws of online roleplay, just as the store clerk is owed nothing for the candy bar that was just stolen from his store. Please show me where I have stated otherwise. But the asshole who just stole the candy bar is STILL AN ASSHOLE! And the store owner can post his security cam face all over his windows.

You, antfucker!

Wasn't really talking about you, or anyone specifically from Lit-E at all, but okay.

Apology

I had to step away from Lit and similar activities for a while, partly for personal issues, but mostly because sometimes I found it had taken over so much of my life and brain that I needed a break.

What I apologize for is doing it abruptly and without notice. That was rude. But I just felt overwhelmed and needed to make a clean break. I hate it when people do that to me, and even worse when I do it!

I was not writing with anyone, or deeply involved in a p.m. correspondence at the time, so I suppose that is something.

I have been missing it, so now I have re-enrolled, albeit with a new moniker. I don’t know how deeply I will immerse myself in Lit this time around, as I need to find a ‘happy medium’. But I am following some threads again in this restart.